


A Cliff So Tall

by partypaprika



Category: Green Men Series - K. J. Charles
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2019-12-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 00:28:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21948187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/partypaprika/pseuds/partypaprika
Summary: “Rough night of it, eh?” Barney said, eyeing Max critically. Max considered denying it, but what would be the point?“Yes, sir,” Max said. “Nothing gets by you.”Barney looked at Max, the edges of his lips twitching. “Anything in particular that you want to share with the class? Perhaps a tale or two about your night time romps.”“I brought back a burick and we made a go of the old slithey,” Max said and now Barney was laughing, mission completed there. “Sadly, she realized that I’m terrible in the sack and bolted.”
Relationships: Hugh Barnaby/Max Isaacs
Comments: 10
Kudos: 47
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	A Cliff So Tall

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jain/gifts).



> Jain, I hope you enjoy!

The tentacles gripped tight around Barney’s neck, Barney’s face turning bright red as he desperately tried to get oxygen into his lungs. Max wanted to tell the thing inside of him, the beast that lay within, _Rogo-Tumu-Here_ , to stop. He begged the demon to stop, to let Barney be, but the demon laughed within his head, the sound of nails scratching against slate, the screech of mourners at a funeral, until Max wasn’t sure who was laughing—the demon or himself—all the while, Barney’s struggles became weaker until there were none at all.

Then it was Max who was screaming, wailing at Barney’s side, his tentacles curling in towards him gently, as if they were to pet him, then stiffened at the last minute and cutting deep into his heart.

It was almost a relief to lay there, knowing that he was dying, that the fight would finally be over.

And then Max opened his eyes, once again in bed. He would have bet half-a-bar that his sheets were torn to pieces. He would have felt more remorse about it, but his sheets were all a bit naff anyways. No point in getting anything for his room that couldn’t survive ten rounds with a pug.

The dream came back to him—so vivid that his chest hurt with half-remembered pain—and he was out of bed and unlocking his door, knocking on Barney’s door before he even thought about it.

Barney opened up the door right away. There was no blood, lungs appeared to be in working order, and Max felt a swell of relief crest through him. Unlike Max, who still wore his worn pyjamas, Barney had dressed for the day in one of his tailored lounge suits that he favoured, charcoal brown, and his blond hair slicked back. He filled the outline of the suit perfectly and looked like he was ready for tea with the King.

“Rough night of it, eh?” Barney said, eyeing Max critically. Max considered denying it, but what would be the point?

“Yes, sir,” Max said. “Nothing gets by you.”

Barney looked at Max, the edges of his lips twitching. “Anything in particular that you want to share with the class? Perhaps a tale or two about your night time romps.”

“I brought back a burick and we made a go of the old slithey,” Max said and now Barney was laughing, mission completed there. “Sadly, she realized that I’m terrible in the sack and bolted.”

Max didn’t want to think about old-you-know-who any more than he possibly had to. Neither of them were especially pleased with their current arrangement. Once upon a time, Max wouldn’t have known that about the demon. But the demon had been getting stronger. One of these days, when Max woke up, it wouldn’t be Max looking through his eyes. Max had a ticking clock inside him.

“Chop, chop, let’s get to it,” Barney said and Max snapped to attention. Barney had been Max’s lieutenant during the war. At the start of it, he’d been just another dull and replaceable public school officer, with a sharp accent that immediately made Max want to dip his hands into Barney’s pockets just to show that he could. Only after they’d both been selected for the Seventh Experimental Regiment did Max discover that there was something worth digging in deeper.

Barney had saved Max in more ways than one and Max owed Barney his life. Near the end of the war, they’d been sent to fight in Belgium and Max had been ordered to let Rogo loose. This was back before Max understood how to coexist with Rogo—back then, it could only be one or the other. They’d stood on a field soaked in blood and buried in bones and, upon penalty of death and for the honour of his country, Max had let Rogo take him.

What had it accomplished? He’d killed four German arcanists and almost been killed himself—trapped in a hell dimension—until Barney had made a bargain with Rogo to bring Max back.

Max had never gotten Barney to tell him what he’d given Rogo. And Rogo wasn’t especially inclined to share. Whatever it was, it couldn’t have been anything good.

“Bloody hell, sir, it’s barely scout’s hour,” Max complained good-naturedly.

“Randolph has a mission for us,” Barney said.

Max groaned. “I expect that I’ll be having wind pudding for breakfast then.”

Barney raised an eyebrow in that handsome way that he had. “Mustn’t be a poor sport about it. If you’re especially good, I’ll even shout you lunch.”

Max grumbled on the way back to his room. Inside of him, he felt the demon screech, its tentacles rising to the surface of his skin, howling for independence. It found the deference and obedience that Max gave to Barney unfathomable, but Max forced his weapons deep within him.

 _Tick tock_ , Rogo said.

Max ignored him.

They arrived home that night covered in something that Sam had once called ectoplasm and what Max called bloody fucking disgusting ghost guts. Saul stopped short when he saw them as he left the book room.

“Not a run of the mill ghost on Old Street?” Saul asked. Sam appeared behind Saul and then disappeared for a second before coming out bearing two glasses of blue ruin. Barney grabbed them eagerly and then handed one to Max.

“Cheers, old mate,” Barney said, clinking his glass against Max’s before downing his own.

“Cheers, old bugger,” Max said and drank his own.

Saul shook his head at them once, likely in disbelief how he’d managed to end up at such a point in his life where his flatmates regularly came home covered in translucent goop and their only concern was drinking a glass of gin.

“I’m off to meet with Randolph,” Saul said. “We’ll be grabbing dinner at the Arcane Arts Club, if anyone wants to join.”

Barney threw a look to Max. They’d be making cow eyes at each other all night and playing poke the bear under the table. No, thank you.

“Can’t,” Sam said and sauntered towards the stairs. “I have a date with a nice glass of scotch and a letter to write. I’ll be in my room, gentlemen.”

“Max? Barney?” Saul asked.

Barney looked so sincerely apologetic that he would have pulled the wool over Max’s own mum and there was a woman of great scepticism. “We’re chuffed by the invitation, but Isaacs and I have to do some research on the Old Street ghost. Pesky little blighter. We’ll need to make sure we’re prepared in the extreme should it return.”

“Absolutely,” Saul said. “Well, goodnight, gentlemen.” He let himself out of the door and disappeared into the night.

From the stairs, Sam rolled his eyes. Saul was new enough that he accepted this excuse without question, as if Barney was ever inclined to do research of his own volition. Ten to one, he’d throw those yews at Max and try to get Max to do it. Ten to one, Max would probably do it.

“Let me know how that research goes,” Sam said, his voice dry.

“Are you doubting the veracity of what I said?” Barney said.

“As someone in the know, I can say with certainty that the only research you’ll be getting up to tonight will be what does one find at the bottom of a glass.”

No disagreement from Max there.

After the two of them cleaned up, Max cooked dinner for the two of them. He wasn’t much of a cook, but it had become apparent when Randolph forcibly moved Max and Barney into 166 Fetter Lane (or the Mad House, as Max fondly referred to it in his head) that neither Sam nor Barney could be relied upon to fend for themselves. Left to their own devices, they’d eat leftover capers and scraps of mayonnaise from the jar.

Max set about making a celery soup, putting some potatoes and lamb in the oven to roast.

“Smells divine,” Barney said. "Deluxe, delightful, et cetera, et cetera. Good lord, how do you make it all smell so good.”

“Mainly by keeping the officers out of the kitchen,” Max said, but that only encouraged Barney to drape himself over Max and rest his chin on Max’s shoulder. The warmth of Barney felt deliciously good and Max wanted nothing more than to lean back into it and let it envelope him completely.

“You know us officers: telling us to poke our beaks in another direction just makes us all the more likely to dig in our heels.”

“With all due respect, sir,” Max said. “I think that’s just you.” Unspoken was the fact that Max liked it that way.

“Perhaps, perhaps,” Barney said and blew out a breath that tickled the hair on the back of Max’s neck. Max shivered at the contact. “How much longer until the jarry is ready?”

“It’ll be ready when it’s ready,” Max said.

“Insubordinate,” Barney said fondly.

“Berk,” Max said back, probably just as fondly.

 _Tick tock_ , Rogo said within Max.

They ate in the dining room before moving to the book room for additional libations, Barney mixing them martinis as they played cards.

At some point, Max fell asleep, and when he woke up, he was in hell. Not Hell, but rather a hell, one of the hells, a searing existence of pain and suffering. Large black worms, each the size of a large lamp and at least half a dozen of them, bit through Max’s skin, each one painful enough to make Max scream. Rogo intangibly pressed behind him, his body studded with thorns that cut into Max as well, and Max threw out his tentacles without thought.

Today they were inky black at their ends, fading to a dusky purple at the top. As Rogo pressed in behind Max, his spikes seemed to transfer through Max, appearing on the outside of his tentacles. They were tipped in steel and the air whistled by as Max snapped them.

The worms cried out, dropping, pale flesh splitting underneath their dark exteriors as Max sliced through them. They kept coming, new ones arising in their place, sharp teeth coming for more, but as Max killed, each death felt right. Each death felt justified. Some part of him that had once been Rogo but was now Max revelled in their deaths.

As he cleared a path for himself, Max spotted Barney in the distance fighting desperately. He was outnumbered, the enormous black worms swarming him and Max could hear Rogo chanting behind him, the words foreign and yet understandable, chanting of death and destruction. Max wanted it all—he wanted to kill everything that stood between him and Barney. He wanted to hurt everyone that had ever hurt Barney.

He came closer and closer, all pain second-hand to saving Barney. When he got halfway to Barney, he saw that Barney’s own tentacles were unfurled, sharp as knives, but he was bleeding from a dozen places, his colour pale, and his tentacles slow and sloppy.

“Max,” Barney shouted across the distance. “Max!” And then the swarm overtook him, burying him, and Max screamed and screamed but he couldn’t stop them and Rogo laughed, high and piercing in his ear.

“Max!” Barney yelled again and Max woke up, gulping at air, his tentacles unfurled and black as midnight. Barney’s own tentacles were out, their edges soft and protective, curling around Max, holding him tight.

One of Barney’s tentacles came close, the satin-smooth texture wiping beneath Max’s eyes and Max realized that he’d been crying.

“Isaacs—Max,” Barney said and he sounded so broken.

“I’m sorry,” Max got out.

“I hate them,” Barney said passionately. “I hate them all for what they’ve done to you.” Behind Max, he could hear Rogo laughing with joy, _And me—for they have set me free_.

“He’s coming closer,” Max said as one of Barney’s tentacles pulled Max even closer until he and Barney were pressed together. He couldn’t stop himself from speaking, the words spilling out although Max would have given almost anything to take them back. “One of these days, he will be here, in my skin. He will be here.”

Barney shushed him and held him close. Eventually, Max began to relax in Barney’s grip, his own tentacles becoming pliant and vulnerable, their studded tips retreating, and they curled around Barney.

Max let his forehead rest against Barney’s and thought about what was happening. He was going to die one way or another. Rogo was coming for him and there was no stopping him, only slowing Rogo down to die by degrees.

So Max took the leap he’d been thinking of for years, the half-dream that he’d held onto in the darkest days of his binding with Rogo. He kissed Barney and Barney kissed back. He kissed like he’d been waiting for it, like it was his due and he’d been waiting all this time for Max to get on board.

One of Barney’s tentacles reached out and flicked the door shut.

When they finished, Hugh sat up, his body focused, despite the fact that he was as bare as the day he was born. “We’ll need to come up with a plan,” he said, as if he was already preparing the battle in his head.

Max flopped down on the floor. “All due respect, sir—”

“Max—I feel that if we’ve engaged in a faire l’amour, as the French say, we can set aside certain formalities, namely that I am no longer your officer and that we are perhaps closer than strangers,” Barney said.

“All due respect, Barney,” Max said. “There is no plan for Rogo. I’m not just being milky. What the army did to me, we can’t change it. Not by oil of angels or good wishes. He is relentless.”

“Max, do you trust me?” Barney asked. Max would have gone to the end of the world for Barney—he had to know that by now.

“Of course, sir—Barney,” Max said.

“Then we will find a way out of this,” Barney said. He kissed Max and then helped him up. “Come, let’s sneak upstairs.”

In the morning, Barney assembled the team: Randolph, Saul, Sam and, of course, Max and Barney. They nibbled on eggs, toast, sausages and bacon as Barney lay out what he knew. They looked to Max for clarification, although it wasn’t especially complicated—someone had made a deal with a demon and Max had been the beneficiary of the transaction.

_Tick Tock_

“I’ve told him to piss off,” Max said. “But as he’s comprised of pure power, he doesn’t seem inclined to listen to me.”

Randolph frowned. “I have an idea,” he said slowly. “Although, I don’t want to raise any hopes. I’ll need to see the binding that the army laid on you. This sounds like an incomplete binding. I wish you’d come to me sooner about this.”

Max looked down. He liked Randolph—Randolph had made his life bearable when the war had ended. Max would have been on the streets without Randolph’s help. “I’m sorry,” Max said.

“Stop that,” Randolph said firmly. “None of that boorish self-pity here. We will solve this. You have the best occult minds in the country at your disposal.”

Max looked over at Barney nodded. “Of course.”

Sylvia Phan came by that afternoon, a purse almost half her size hanging off of her shoulder. Max met her at the door. She took one look at him and recoiled.

“What have they done to you?” she said.

Max shrugged. “Come on in, miss, everyone will be down shortly.”

At the top of the house, Sam and Randolph had converted one of the rooms into a practice room. Barney met them on the way up and Sylvia gasped again. She looked between the two of them and then marched herself up to the room directly.

“Randolph Glyde,” she said threateningly. “You said that you had one potentially incorrect binding to deal with. You clearly omitted the fact that yet another one of your charges is in just as bad of a situation.”

Randolph, Sam, Max and Saul all spun to look at Barney, who cheeks had turned splotchy red.

“What is she talking about?” Randolph said, his tone stern, as if they were all school boys who’d behaved poorly during lessons.

But Max already knew. “You never said anything,” he said.

Barney shrugged. “I didn’t think that it was—I hoped it wasn’t serious.”

“Serious is as serious does,” Sylvia said. “I suppose that we will need to deal with both of these problems immediately.” She peered again at each of Max and Barney. “Mainly as their souls are in imminent danger of being entirely corrupted.”

The team leaped into action. They’d only contemplated one re-binding as of that morning, per se, but never let it be said that they couldn’t adjust quickly, another chair found, the pentagram enlarged, Randolph laying a larger protective ward on the room.

When Sylvia deemed everything ready, Randolph and Saul removed Barney’s and Max’s shirts and then tied them to the chairs. Randolph then took out a long, thin paintbrush and instructed Saul and Sam to leave the room. Carefully, following Sylvia’s clipped directions, he began to paint on each of their chests.

“What are you painting?” Barney asked.

“Rodriguez’s six words of power,” Sylvia said. “And I ask you to please not interrupt Mr. Glyde. Painting these words without tearing a hole through reality is difficult enough as is.”

“Right-o,” Barney said and fell silent.

Max knew that Barney was nervous—how could he not be—so although he had limited mobility underneath the bindings, he could move his hand a few inches. Barney was close enough that when Max carefully reached out a hand, he could just barely touch Barney’s. Barney stiffened and then relaxed, his hand coming around to hold Max’s as well.

Sylvia didn’t say anything to that.

Eventually, Randolph finished painting the important words of whomever on Max and Barney and when he stood up, he stood up stiffly, like an old man.

“Ready?” Sylvia asked.

Randolph stepped out of the pentagram and nodded. They both took a deep breath and then, with one deep and dark voice, they began to chant.

For a while, nothing happened, and then Randolph, followed by Sylvia, took a knife and cut their arms, letting blood drip down over the pentagram. It sizzled when it hit the floor, a thick cloud of smoke following, and Max couldn’t help but cough, the smoke coming through on each breath. Each breath burned through his lungs, the coughing increasing and increasing until Max thought that there was a decent chance that he would cough up something irreplaceable.

After a long bout of coughing that left Max feeling raw and sore, two figures began coalescing in the smoke.

The one near Max moved into being, coalescing into the ugly and familiar enemy. Rogo-Tumu-Here’s eyes were blood-red, his head shaped like a fish, with large sharp teeth like a shark’s. Where a torso or body would be, Rogo only had tentacles—eight of them, sharp as knives, whipping out. Rogo spoke to Max: _I am here as I promised. I will collect upon my debt and I shall enjoy making you suffer._

Rogo looked over to Barney who stared in horror at the monstrosity in front of him, a corruption of a man, with tentacles streaming out from all over his body and a mouth that opened to reveal layers of needle-thin teeth that would tear anything in his way to pieces.

 _I will enjoy making him suffer as well. It will increase your own_.

As Rogo took the first step forward, Sylvia and Randolph began chanting again. The words battered themselves against Max’s ears, but he couldn’t make them out. He felt something thick and wet sliding down from his ears, but that was nothing compared to the fear utterly consuming him.

Sylvia smashed a vial on the floor and poured it out onto the pentagram and Rogo screamed once, so loudly, Max thought that he might pass out from the pain.

“Hold on, old chap,” Barney was saying, squeezing the edge of Max’s hand. Max tried, but the pain became too much and he began to fade in and out, the screaming going on and on in Max’s head even as he begged for it to stop.

Eventually, Rogo screamed once more, so loudly that it snapped Max back to attention. Rogo became smaller and diaphanous and his body moved closer and closer to Max, despite Max’s best attempts to push the chair back. With one last roar, Rogo’s body fell into Max and everything flared up within Max, a full tidal wave of sensation, his tentacles rising to the surface of his skin, before he blacked out again.

This time, when Max woke up, he lay on his own bed, Barney next to him.

“Excellent, you’re alive,” Sam said from near the window.

“Shut it,” Max said, his voice creaky.

“How do you feel?” Sam asked. “The re-binding almost killed you. Unsurprising, your former illustrious commanders did a piss-poor hash of it the first time around.”

Max took a moment to catalogue his body. Everything ached, like he’d been runover by a horse. But his body felt settled in a way that it hadn’t in almost ten years. Taking a deep breath, he brought his tentacles came out and they obeyed beautifully, showing a pale sunrise colour as he curled and unfurled them. They felt stronger. Better. Like Max’s and not a debt owed to the devil. Or a devil.

“No use pretending that you’re asleep, Barney,” Sam said. “That trick won’t work on me.”

“It was worth a go,” Barney said.

When Sam was finally satisfied by the answers to his queries, he left them alone.

“We survived,” Max said, turning and facing Barney.

“We have survived,” Barney said. “I don’t mean to be presumptuous here, but please tell me now if the pre-almost dying romp was just meant to be a fun roll in the hay.”

Max shot Barney a look of pure insult and Barney brightened at that.

“Excellent, excellent,” Barney said. “My Max. And I’m your Barney.”

“You are mine,” Max agreed. “No one else would take us.”

“We wouldn’t take anyone else,” Barney corrected. “Now come here. You are entirely too far away.”

Who was Max to disobey a direct order?


End file.
